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Supernatural: The Real Ghostbusters
Decide what this is about
Write a second verse yourself
~from Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
I would first like to say: I am really, actually shocked by how strong my feelings are about this episode. I, I don't even know.
I subscribe to the validity of multiple interpretations of a work. I think that this is the underpinning of most modern media fannish (largely female) interaction with our shows. I think it is foolish and irrelevant to tell someone they're interrogating the text wrong. I don't think there is a wrong way to interrogate the text, even if I disagree with your specific conclusions.
I've been reading people on my dreamroll finding the most recent episode of Supernatural frustrating, infuriating, misogynistic, dismissive of us (women) as fans and of our ways of being fannish. Here are some links that talk about those things:
http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/94648.html
http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/185610.html
http://giandujakiss.dreamwidth.org/129847.html
http://coffeeandink.dreamwidth.org/1039724.html
http://justhuman.dreamwidth.org/476877.html
I think those are valid interpretations and all things that someone needed to say, but I choose another interpretation.
(Imposing a chosen interpretation on a work is one of our fannish modes of interaction with the work. I feel this is especially important to do if one feels one's modes of fannishness are under attack. Why on earth should we let someone who says we're interrogating the text wrong have the last word on how to interrogate a text?)
I choose to interpret this episode as an affirmation of multiplicity of interpretation. I choose to interpret the many different pairs of Sams and Deans as fannish interpretations of the show's Sam and Dean, and I choose to interpret the recognition and elevation of the gay couple as a nod to and acceptance of slash fandom. I think the lack of women represented (more on this in a moment) in the episode was problematic, but I think the message regarding gay Sam and Dean would have suffered if that particular focus pair of fans had been women. I think it would have distorted the message to objectification of women, to It's cool if you slash them as long as they're chicks, because lesbians are hot--to the eyes of us heterosexual cisgendered males. I think the choice of the male pair and Dean's surprised but smiling reaction said: I know this is what you're interested in, I don't get it but it's not really necessary for me to get it; enjoy what you enjoy.
I think there may be a framing issue at play. Do I choose to frame this episode as a representation of fandom, and feel excluded, or do I choose to frame this episode as half of a conversation, to which I am invited to reply?
I choose: Conversation. As I say, half a conversation, because while the show can speak about us or to us, it cannot speak for us. I suspect this is at the heart of why there are so few women in this episode: Kripke does not understand us, and does not know what we would say. Imagine if the focus pair of cosplayers had been women. There, on your screen, female fans who decide to follow in Sam and Dean's footsteps. But would it make their words any less Kripke's words? Either the character speaking with the voice of the author, as many of us have commonly interpreted the argument regarding What Supernatural Is About to be, all the more insidious for being voiced by a puppet with our face, or else a parody, what Kripke thinks we think? The only way those hypothetical women could truly represent us is if they were truly written by a female fan.
Except... what female fan could possibly do justice to us, to all of us? It is perhaps worth noting that a woman received story credit on this episode, Nancy Weiner. She has two credits on her imdb page, this and the introduction of the Supernatural books storyline last season. So I don't know her from Adam, and I don't feel she represents me. I'd be plenty happy to be represented in the writing room by Doris Egan, but that's just me, I don't know how well she does or doesn't represent you.
So, okay, from what I can tell from the writing credits, Kripke ran with Weiner's idea and he served up this episode with only a couple of women. He didn't try to represent female fans as a mass or a variety; Becky, previously established, is the only female fan here. Most of the fans depicted in the episode are men. They seem, more or less, to be representing how Kripke views the show. This is half a conversation. The other half? The other half is out here.
---
I want to tell you a story about Leticia Gore, a role by two players, and who she is to the man writing the story.
I thought you were evil. I thought what you did was killing my stories. I felt like you destroyed my boys.
I was wrong.
I was mad, I was scared, I tried to get rid of you. Part of me had reservations about this, the part that is like what I think you're probably like: the part that loves this story enthusiastically, possessively, obsessively, sometimes naively. That part of me said: you're real, you're like me, is it really right to attack you. And the mad, scared part of me said: you're an evil, crazy bitch; it's time to man up and take you out.
But I was wrong.
What really happened was: you loved my stories, you loved them so much you took them in as your own, and made your own stories to play with them. And then I hurt you, I used my stories to tear down your stories, and you lashed out, because I hurt you.
So now I'm asking you to come back. I don't understand you, I don't know what it is you see in my stories, I don't know how you got here, I'm not sure you get it, and I'm giving you lines because I don't know what you'd want to say yourself. But, here. I want you to come back and be part of this, because you belong here. I promise you'll be safe this time. I'm still learning how to control my stories, how to keep them from hurting you, but I'm doing my best.
---
I think it's tempting to look to Sam and Dean for what Kripke thinks, but I think Kripke has more in common with another character in this episode. He wrote the writer for us; I think he might have been trying to speak there.
Here is what I hear when I listen to Chuck:
I don't know what I'm doing. I'm afraid I'm a no-talent hack and I don't know what I'll do after this show because I don't know what else I have to offer, and I don't even understand what's so great about this that you like it so much.
I feel like it's not mine, I feel like something I thought I created has a life of its own that I don't have any right to.
I feel like I poured my heart and soul into this and no one cares about that, no one's listening.
I want you to love me for my story and I'm afraid that no one notices that part, that all you care about is how hot the boys are.
I'm afraid that you care more about the story than I do. I'm afraid that makes me a bad writer.
Such are writers' insecurities; I have them too. I don't know a good writer who doesn't. But yeah, I think he really doesn't get us, at least partially because he doesn't understand what he did to interest us in his show. I think he loves us and he wants to understand, wants to get it, and so he drafted an episode in the shape of a question, a half a conversation, to say: So this is where I'm coming from, what about you?
---
This is the interpretation I choose. It's very weird for me that it hinges so on what Kripke thinks, because usually multiplicity of interpretation is all about how the experiences that shape the viewer's interpretation are as valid as whatever the writer thought he was trying to say. But this is a meta episode and as such Kripke was putting his thoughts and fears onscreen, in a format that is open to interpretation. This is the interpretation of Kripke I choose.
Write a second verse yourself
~from Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
I would first like to say: I am really, actually shocked by how strong my feelings are about this episode. I, I don't even know.
I subscribe to the validity of multiple interpretations of a work. I think that this is the underpinning of most modern media fannish (largely female) interaction with our shows. I think it is foolish and irrelevant to tell someone they're interrogating the text wrong. I don't think there is a wrong way to interrogate the text, even if I disagree with your specific conclusions.
I've been reading people on my dreamroll finding the most recent episode of Supernatural frustrating, infuriating, misogynistic, dismissive of us (women) as fans and of our ways of being fannish. Here are some links that talk about those things:
http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/94648.html
http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/185610.html
http://giandujakiss.dreamwidth.org/129847.html
http://coffeeandink.dreamwidth.org/1039724.html
http://justhuman.dreamwidth.org/476877.html
I think those are valid interpretations and all things that someone needed to say, but I choose another interpretation.
(Imposing a chosen interpretation on a work is one of our fannish modes of interaction with the work. I feel this is especially important to do if one feels one's modes of fannishness are under attack. Why on earth should we let someone who says we're interrogating the text wrong have the last word on how to interrogate a text?)
I choose to interpret this episode as an affirmation of multiplicity of interpretation. I choose to interpret the many different pairs of Sams and Deans as fannish interpretations of the show's Sam and Dean, and I choose to interpret the recognition and elevation of the gay couple as a nod to and acceptance of slash fandom. I think the lack of women represented (more on this in a moment) in the episode was problematic, but I think the message regarding gay Sam and Dean would have suffered if that particular focus pair of fans had been women. I think it would have distorted the message to objectification of women, to It's cool if you slash them as long as they're chicks, because lesbians are hot--to the eyes of us heterosexual cisgendered males. I think the choice of the male pair and Dean's surprised but smiling reaction said: I know this is what you're interested in, I don't get it but it's not really necessary for me to get it; enjoy what you enjoy.
I think there may be a framing issue at play. Do I choose to frame this episode as a representation of fandom, and feel excluded, or do I choose to frame this episode as half of a conversation, to which I am invited to reply?
I choose: Conversation. As I say, half a conversation, because while the show can speak about us or to us, it cannot speak for us. I suspect this is at the heart of why there are so few women in this episode: Kripke does not understand us, and does not know what we would say. Imagine if the focus pair of cosplayers had been women. There, on your screen, female fans who decide to follow in Sam and Dean's footsteps. But would it make their words any less Kripke's words? Either the character speaking with the voice of the author, as many of us have commonly interpreted the argument regarding What Supernatural Is About to be, all the more insidious for being voiced by a puppet with our face, or else a parody, what Kripke thinks we think? The only way those hypothetical women could truly represent us is if they were truly written by a female fan.
Except... what female fan could possibly do justice to us, to all of us? It is perhaps worth noting that a woman received story credit on this episode, Nancy Weiner. She has two credits on her imdb page, this and the introduction of the Supernatural books storyline last season. So I don't know her from Adam, and I don't feel she represents me. I'd be plenty happy to be represented in the writing room by Doris Egan, but that's just me, I don't know how well she does or doesn't represent you.
So, okay, from what I can tell from the writing credits, Kripke ran with Weiner's idea and he served up this episode with only a couple of women. He didn't try to represent female fans as a mass or a variety; Becky, previously established, is the only female fan here. Most of the fans depicted in the episode are men. They seem, more or less, to be representing how Kripke views the show. This is half a conversation. The other half? The other half is out here.
---
I want to tell you a story about Leticia Gore, a role by two players, and who she is to the man writing the story.
I thought you were evil. I thought what you did was killing my stories. I felt like you destroyed my boys.
I was wrong.
I was mad, I was scared, I tried to get rid of you. Part of me had reservations about this, the part that is like what I think you're probably like: the part that loves this story enthusiastically, possessively, obsessively, sometimes naively. That part of me said: you're real, you're like me, is it really right to attack you. And the mad, scared part of me said: you're an evil, crazy bitch; it's time to man up and take you out.
But I was wrong.
What really happened was: you loved my stories, you loved them so much you took them in as your own, and made your own stories to play with them. And then I hurt you, I used my stories to tear down your stories, and you lashed out, because I hurt you.
So now I'm asking you to come back. I don't understand you, I don't know what it is you see in my stories, I don't know how you got here, I'm not sure you get it, and I'm giving you lines because I don't know what you'd want to say yourself. But, here. I want you to come back and be part of this, because you belong here. I promise you'll be safe this time. I'm still learning how to control my stories, how to keep them from hurting you, but I'm doing my best.
---
I think it's tempting to look to Sam and Dean for what Kripke thinks, but I think Kripke has more in common with another character in this episode. He wrote the writer for us; I think he might have been trying to speak there.
Here is what I hear when I listen to Chuck:
I don't know what I'm doing. I'm afraid I'm a no-talent hack and I don't know what I'll do after this show because I don't know what else I have to offer, and I don't even understand what's so great about this that you like it so much.
I feel like it's not mine, I feel like something I thought I created has a life of its own that I don't have any right to.
I feel like I poured my heart and soul into this and no one cares about that, no one's listening.
I want you to love me for my story and I'm afraid that no one notices that part, that all you care about is how hot the boys are.
I'm afraid that you care more about the story than I do. I'm afraid that makes me a bad writer.
Such are writers' insecurities; I have them too. I don't know a good writer who doesn't. But yeah, I think he really doesn't get us, at least partially because he doesn't understand what he did to interest us in his show. I think he loves us and he wants to understand, wants to get it, and so he drafted an episode in the shape of a question, a half a conversation, to say: So this is where I'm coming from, what about you?
---
This is the interpretation I choose. It's very weird for me that it hinges so on what Kripke thinks, because usually multiplicity of interpretation is all about how the experiences that shape the viewer's interpretation are as valid as whatever the writer thought he was trying to say. But this is a meta episode and as such Kripke was putting his thoughts and fears onscreen, in a format that is open to interpretation. This is the interpretation of Kripke I choose.
no subject
no subject
I think Becky is *adorable* in that the guys don't know what to think of her, but she's totally in the moment and totally herself.
Oh, that's totally a part of the theme, yeah? They don't get her, but she's awesome.
no subject
I have a little trouble subscribing to this fully since Show is not REALLY a single author event -- there is the network and other writers and directors and actors and so on to consider -- but turning off those points and watching this episode as a dialogue between me and Kripke? Has its own kind of meta awesome.
no subject
Oh god why meeeeeeeeeeeeee *laugh*
Show is not REALLY a single author event
Yes, that's true, many people contribute. But the guy running the show, the guy whose vision everyone is working to support and advance, in television that's the writer-producer, and Kripke did write this episode (and yeah, I had to look at that before I made up my mind to psychoanalyze him based on it).
no subject
ONE OF US. ONE OF US.
;)
no subject